A place to discuss and explore catholicism ( the universal church) and her intersect with logic and the logos.

A right by any other name might not exist.

There seems to be a lot of confusion in the world about a simple word that has a weighty yet easy definition.

So often we hear and see about ‘rights’. The ‘right’ to abortion, the ‘right’ to gay marriage, the right to work, the right to an education, the right to life.

Many people now days seem like they are always looking for the next ‘right’ to defend, and many times ,ironically, those seeking to ensure their ‘rights’ defend them with ferocious attack on ‘religion’ by which they usually mean moral philosophy that believes in transcendent absolutes.

However, if you look the definition of the word rights you will notice that it is tied directly two the idea of morality which cannot exist without a Transcendent absolute.

The only other definition that is useful in any discussion about rights is the definition of legal rights. However when you are discussing whether or not something should be legal you cannot possibly be discussing a legal right which, by definition, exist only when something is legal.

Now given that, without a transcends absolute, there is no way of defining or measuring what is right or wrong I would encourage any secularist or atheist who reads this to consider or provide thier own definition right prior to an attempt to make a reasonable argument for the existence of any specific right, because before you can expect to convince others of the existence of a specific thing, you must first yourself believe in its existence in the specific and the general case.

Suggestions that ‘religion’ does not belong in a discussion about rights is very like sugesting math doesn’t belong in a discussion about geometry. One being a natural sub category of the other by way of simple definition.